Former Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s legacy was back in the national spotlight on Tuesday night as he took to national television to share his views on the latest developments in the AUKUS treaty, and his “regrets” regarding Robodebt.
But today, there’s another aspect of his legacy in question — with March 15 marking two years since the March 4 Justice protests, and two years since Morrison shared that unforgettable line in parliament that, “not far from here such marches, even now, are being met with bullets.”
Morrison made the comment during Question Time back in 2021, which occurred as thousands of protesters had gathered in Canberra and locations all around Australia, for the March 4 Justice.
During that moment, he’d also taken the time to highlight the stats concerning violence against women — which included the one in four women who had suffered violence at the hands of an intimate partner since the age of 15. But he did not use the moment to outline anything his government would actually do about the problem.
His “met with bullets” line was the one that would be remembered, a condescending dismissal of the concerns of women.
As we wrote back in 2021 and as it’s clear now, Morrison had hoped that the March 4 Justice movement would be a minor annoyance. A hashtag involving a small group of protesters that could largely be avoided — but he was quickly proven wrong, and a little over a year later faced one of the biggest federal election losses in Australian history.
Morrison’s preference to describe the protesters as a “triumph of democracy” and a portrait of a “lucky” Australia where you can participate in such gatherings represents more than quotable quotes. It was a moment that would come to represent his legacy of serious misjudgment regarding the power of the women’s vote, and the potential of women that would culminate in women not only voting to boot his government out but also running for election to directly challenge his once safe Liberal colleagues.
In late 2022, the Liberal party’s own assessment of its massive 2022 Federal election loss found that a failure to address the concerns of women was one of the key drivers. The review stated that “very importantly, the prime minister was not attuned to the concerns of women.” It also noted that the Liberal party only holds three of the 30 seats across Australia that have the highest proportion of professional women.
But last night on ABC, there were other questions about Morrison’s legacy in focus.
While most of the 730 interview focused on Morrison’s take on the latest developments of the AUKUS announcement — with him described as the “grandfather of AUKUS”, Sarah Ferguson also described the former PM as the “grandfather of Robodebt”.
The Robodebt scheme is fast becoming known as one of the worst policy failures in Australian history. It saw hundreds of thousands of Australians illegally chased down for debts they did not owe and, as the Royal Commission into the scheme has heard over the past nine weeks, resulted in devastating consequences for some of those affected.
Morrison was the social services minister when the program was introduced in 2015. But he prefers to think of himself now as the prime minister who put a stop to the program, which is a creative way to frame his involvement.
But on reflection now in 2023, Morrison didn’t go so far as to call the program immoral, despite being found to be illegal. Asked about the morality of the scheme, he preferred to comment on the “regrettable” nature of it.
“It is totally regrettable and it is a very sad thing that has occurred,” he said. “I only wish that at the time when we were advised that it was unlawful.”
Ferguson pressed on the morality aspect further, and Morrison responded that “the outcome” of the scheme was different to its intention.
“I think the idea of ensuring the taxpayers’ money which is paid is done properly is the principle. And I think that principle is right. But clearly, how this was executed, on an industrial scale, failed that test.”